The Most Outrageous Criminals Who Seriously Outsmarted The Cops!

This guy wasn’t a genius mastermind, but close-ish. He wanted to rob a jewellers, so he hid in the empty flat next door and set off the alarm repeatedly for two weeks. Police and workers got headaches but found nothing. The jewellers got fed up and turned off the alarm one night, and that’s when our robber tore down the wall and took his sweet time stealing the loot. He got away until morning when someone noticed. Tried to sell a serial-numbered item and got caught - so not THAT smart after all. Hey, points for persistence!

A homeless dude got the perfect hack. He realized petty theft got him a free night in jail, with a warm bed and hot food. So he’d steal a little, get arrested, have a cozy meal and bed, get out, then do it again. The police just sighed and started telling him to return his loot next day. What a legend.

Picture this: a guy builds a parking booth on city land, manning it day in, day out for a decade. One day, the city calls the tourist spot and asks, “Where’s your parking guy?” The city replies, “What parking guy?” Turns out, the old dude built and ran the whole thing solo, vanished without a trace, and no one ever knew who he was. The ultimate ghost parking attendant.

This clever shoplifter knew stores put stickers on stuff when you walk in with an item. So, they snatched a cheap nylon product to snag the “I walked in with this” sticker. Then they peeled it, slapped it on a pricey box in electronics, and tried to return it without a receipt. Store said no, so they just walked out with the stickered expensive stuff. Sneaky and simple, before cameras and tech took over.

Shoplifters got creative! A crew once released a pigeon inside fancy tailor shops. While everyone was running around trying to catch the bird (because what else would you do?), the crooks helped themselves to some suits. No cameras back then, so this could’ve been a smooth getaway. Just imagine, distractions with feathers and fashion!

This guy wasn’t just smashing and grabbing. He sneaked a GPS onto people’s cars who owned houses he wanted to rob. Smart move! That way, he could track their every move to make sure the coast was clear while he ransacked the place. Modern crime meets spy skills.

Forget sneaky alarm cutting. This guy went all in - he cut every alarm in town by hacking into a main phone trunk line. Boom! Whole town lost phone service for a bit. Meanwhile, he robbed an audio store while chaos reigned. Later, when cops showed up, he refused entry (no warrant!), escaped, was caught, then even escaped prison transport by unlocking his own shackles and climbing out a vent! Talk about plot twist.

This crook wasn’t content just breaking rules - he forged court documents to set himself free from prison. Talk about playing the game from the inside out. Houdini vibes all day.

In one neighborhood, a hoarder’s porch was filled with junk. Nearby, someone tried selling their house, but weirdly, folks on Craigslist kept thinking everything on that hoarder’s porch was free for taking - even though it wasn’t! Police got multiple calls, but the posters kept denying they put the stuff online. Mystery and mayhem at the porch, anyone?

Meet Jim (not really Jim). He wanted a fancy superbike he couldn’t afford. So, he stole one, stripped it down to just frame and engine bottom half, then buried and half-burned it in his backyard. Later, he called cops to report the ‘abandoned bike’ in his garden. Turns out it was stolen, insurance declared it a write-off, and the police gave it back to him! Jim rebuilt it, re-registered it, and cruised free. Absolute legend.

Some kids masterminded a sneaker heist involving firecrackers! One kid set off a bunch of them on the opposite side of the store, causing chaos. While security checked the commotion, the others bolted out the emergency exit with the kicks. A getaway car was waiting outside - almost took out the chaser! Sneaky and explosive.

In a river-divided town with only one big bridge connecting both sides, some clever crooks called in fake bomb threats at a posh hotel, making police rush over the bridge. Then bam - another threat on the bridge itself, freezing police in their tracks. Meanwhile, they robbed the other side in peace. Talk about misdirection gold.

One dude noticed a secret spot where two bank vault walls met - just enough space to hide. He rented a safety deposit box, rigged a clock alarm to check for sound sensors, then got locked inside over the weekend. While everyone else left, he quietly smashed open other safety deposit boxes, grabbed what he wanted, replaced the locks perfectly, and walked out the door dressed as a worker. The bank never noticed until a customer found a lock falling apart. He only got caught after bragging too much. Boss moves!

A guy in Israel got pulled over for speeding and handed the cop his Costco membership card instead of a driver's license. The cop, clueless, asked what Costco was. The dude joked it was his 'state.' The cop bought it (kind of), and the ticket got written out to "Costco Driver's License." The guy framed the ticket and keeps it as a trophy. Priceless.

Someone stole a priceless chandelier from a jewelry store but skipped the vault (smart move or madness?). The owner’s daughter was found half-naked in the store, claiming night walking. Cops suspected her but there was no camera footage to confirm. They tracked her Mexico trip, raided her cottage - only to find her chilling in lingerie. The chandelier remains missing, rumored somewhere in Germany's black market. Mystery chandelier forever.

A criminal with a trick up his sleeve. When cornered, he’d fake insanity. His girlfriend played along saying he was off meds. Police would send him to a psych ward with orders to release him when stable. But our guy caused distractions to snatch and EAT the release papers! So when he was cleared, no one had the memo to pick him up. He repeated this ten times before cops caught on. Smart, messy, and a bit gross.

A guy stole a real post office mailbox and plopped it next to a bank’s night deposit box. He then added an “out-of-order” sign on the real bank deposit. Businesses, none the wiser, started dropping their deposits into the fake mailbox. Brilliant in its simplicity!

Stopped a super smooth dude with a toolkit for high-end burglaries plus radios and thermal suits. He was the nicest prisoner ever, joking about not being stopped in a decade. The day after his release, a huge tech site got robbed to the tune of $1.5 million, police baffled how no alarms went off. Caught? Nope. Proof? Zip. The nicest mystery man ever.

Two brothers working overnight in retail found a clever way to swipe PS4s. They’d empty dog food bags and sneak the consoles inside, resealing the bags so they looked untouched. After waiting a couple days, they bought their ‘dog food’ from the back and scored big. Sneaky snack time indeed.

Here's a classic: A guy takes a snowblower, goes to the returns desk with no receipt, gets told no, says he’ll be back, then wheels it out the front door anyway. This little stunt was pulled more than once, and employees even helped him load it into his car. Customer service who?

One daring dude smashed through a wall of a Best Buy with a sledgehammer to nab phones and cameras. He was smart: gloves, mask, and timing his getaway to beat slow alarm response. The place included a hidden hill entrance so he escaped through a door that looked normal inside but was 8 feet up outside. Sneaky architect crook moves.

These thieves cut power to electrical stations, messed up wiring, then just hung out waiting for cops and owners to show up. After buildings were closed and power shut off for safety reasons, the thieves worked their way through the now powerless wiring to steal copper. Midnight copper rush, no alarms required.

A French ex-thief turned comedian told a hilarious story: He’d pick a building, pick a floor, and turn an exit door into a fake apartment - complete with numbers, fake lock, and welcome mat. Then he'd sell an iPhone. When the buyer knocked, he’d answer in a robe, say he needed a sec to count money, then vanish down the stairs. Jurassic genius.

Years ago in Florida, a guy tased an armored car guard carrying cash, jumped in a getaway car with stolen plates and vanished. Later, another bank robber switched to a bike, rode through woods to a boat waiting on a waterway, and disappeared with the loot. Classic Florida-style disappearing acts!

After Blockbuster closed, thieves set off its alarm every night for two weeks until cops stopped rushing over, thinking it was a false alarm. Meanwhile, they broke into the neighboring pharmacy by busting through the shared wall - specifically the one spot not covered by shelves. Talk about insider info!

One guy printed fake barcodes showing huge discounts. He’d slap them on $100+ items, but they scanned for just $10. His partner came in later and bought these massively underpriced goods. They sold everything on eBay for a tidy profit. Years of heists until a falling out led to their catch - but dude probably scored tens of thousands before cops caught on.

One slick Walmart thief tossed video games, MP3 players, and booze into a garden section trash can. Employees never looked inside, so he waited hours until trash was loaded into dumpsters and grabbed his loot back. Once, he even ‘used’ an empty box, filled it with a PS3 and games, taped it up, labeled it as “used,” and tossed it in the trash. Jackpot!

This guy masterminded a car theft by flooding 911 with fake theft reports from all over - even different countries - so the police got sent chasing ghosts. Meanwhile, he’d nab luxury cars while police were running around clueless. Never caught, this guy was pure mischief genius.

A man drunk-driving got into a serious crash near a gas station. He ditched the car, ran into the store, bought a six-pack, and downed two beers to ‘cope with the trauma.’ When cops arrived, he showed a receipt proving he only just bought the beer. Cops had zero proof he’d been drinking before the crash. Smooth.

Legend says the Scranton Strangler framed an innocent man and, hurrah for plot twists, was actually one of the jurors who sentenced him. Talk about mixing business with crime!